Virgin Atlantic to cut 3,150 jobs and quit Gatwick base
Virgin Atlantic will cut a third of its workforce and cease its operations at Gatwick airport in a bid to survive the coronavirus crisis, the embattled airline announced today.
The carrier, which will cut 3,150 of 10,000 strong workforce, is the latest airline to announce major job cuts after Ryanair and British Airways.
In a statement, the airline said that it had been forced to take decisive action in order to reduce costs and preserve cash.
It added that negotiations were still ongoing with external stakeholders including the government, which the airline has approached for a £500m loan.
Last month Virgin’s founder Sir Richard Branson warned that without government support the airline was likely to fail, with sister carrier Virgin Australia already having gone into administration.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak has said that airlines will only receive state aid as a last resort once all other funding options have been exhausted.
Virgin said that it was continuing to “explore all available options to obtain additional external funding”.
The carrier warned that it expected it to take three years for demand to return to pre-coronavirus levels, with chief executive Shai Weiss saying it was “crucial” for the company to turn a profit in 2021:
“This will mean taking steps to reshape and resize Virgin Atlantic in line with demand, while always keeping our people and customers at the heart of all we do”, he said.
With British Airways and Ryanair announcing cuts of 12,000 and 3,000 jobs respectively in the last few days, pilots union Balpa said the move was yet another sign of the dire situation the UK aviation industry is facing.
General secretary Brian Strutton said: “Our members and all staff in Virgin will be shocked by the scale of this bombshell. We will be challenging Virgin very hard to justify this”.
“Why is the Government sitting on its hands while aviation plunges further towards a death spiral? Government should call a moratorium on job losses in aviation and lead a planned recovery.”
According to travel data analytics firm Cirium, Virgin held two per cent of Gatwick’s total capacity.
A spokesperson for the airport said: “We are very saddened to hear the news today about Virgin Atlantic’s plans.
“We have had a long, close and successful relationship with the airline since it made its maiden flight from Gatwick back in 1984.
“Virgin Atlantic will always be welcome at Gatwick and we will continue our efforts to explore ways to restart the airline’s operations as soon as possible, in the knowledge that they intend to retain their slot portfolio at Gatwick for when demand returns”.